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The distinction between truth and lie constantly confronts the psychoanalyst who has to apply, in a rough and ready practical way, ideas that have been the centre of discussion over the centuries, but the rough and ready application may be too crude to do the work required of it. The analyst seeks ideas sufficiently accurate and robust to survive the emotional storms they should illuminate.
To the problems of understanding the psychoanalyst can bring something that is unknown to the philosopher of science because he has experience of the dynamics of misunderstanding; he is concerned practically with a problem that the philosopher approaches theoretically. Investigations of understanding and misunderstanding impinge on problems associated with truth and untruth. The reality of the problem becomes apparent when the analyst must ask himself, can a liar be psychoanalysed?
The problem can be formulated in Grid terms without moral overtones. Category 2 (reserved for formulations known by the initiator to be false, but maintained as a barrier against statements that lead to a psychological upheaval), would seem provisionally to offer a home to the lie. Such a categorization supposes that an experience has been permitted to continue to a point where the patient thinks he knows his formulation to be untrue; but is it true that he maintains it because it would be disturbing to his development not to do so? The lie could be uttered because in the view of the liar it would be profitable to him or injurious to another: is it correct in such a case to say it would be true, and if true significant, that inability to profit himself or injure another would lead to his having a psychological upheaval?
As I think it would be true, I must indicate why and in what way it is reasonable to categorize the lie in 2. I am concerned with patients
who come for analysis – not with those who do not. It is clear to such a patient that he risks exposure of the lie; he must either have great confid